Twisted Tales: The President and the King Team Up to Fight the War on Drugs

Posted on Apr 17th 2009 5:00PM by James Sullivan
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"I would love to meet you just to say hello if you're not too busy," wrote this admirer of the president. What the heck, Richard Nixon felt. The writer wasn't just any hick from the sticks. This was Elvis Presley.

On a hideaway vacation in Los Angeles in 1970, the King of Rock 'n' Roll became preoccupied with the idea that he could be of some service to the new presidential administration, which was grappling with a culture war that made Nixon feel as though he was a mortal enemy to the country's young people. Here was a golden opportunity for the president to earn some positive press.

"You must be kidding," responded Nixon chief of staff H.R. Haldeman, later notorious for his role in the Watergate scandal, when a Nixon assistant sent a memo suggesting they consider Elvis' request. Presley's letter, written on a spontaneous cross-country flight to Washington, hinted that he'd like to be appointed a Federal Agent at Large. He had, he said, some useful ties: "The Drug Culture, the Hippie Elements, the SDS [Students for a Democratic Society], Black Panthers, etc., do not consider me their enemy," he wrote, so he could easily keep an eye on them. He'd be checking into the Washington Hotel under the assumed named Jon Burrows, he added, if the president wanted to meet.

In a morning meeting with the deputy director of the federal Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs, Presley, a collector of law-enforcement souvenirs, was denied his request for an honorary badge. But the White House soon called his hotel, arranging a 12:30 meeting between Nixon and his celebrity booster.

After an awkward introduction in the Oval Office, Elvis told the president he was concerned about growing disrespect for the flag, and that he'd been studying the drug culture and "Communist brainwashing"
for years. Nixon promised his new friend he'd get his badge, and he gave Elvis and two members of his entourage, Sonny West and Jerry Schilling, tie clasps and cuff links stamped with the Presidential seal. After lunch and a private tour, Elvis was presented with his badge by the same deputy who'd denied it earlier that day.

"Sonny and Jerry never stopped to ponder the many strange things that had occurred on this day," writes Peter Guralinick in 'Careless Love,' part two of his definitive Presley biography. They were with Elvis, and that explained everything.

The photo of Nixon meeting Elvis, who was dressed not for the White House but the Vegas stage in a capelike Edwardian jacket, an enormous collar and a huge gold belt, is still the single most requested item from the National Archives. Meanwhile, nothing came of Elvis's pledge to monitor the drug culture on behalf of President Nixon. When the King died seven years later, lab reports indicated the cause was "polypharmacy" -- multiple drugs in his system.

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